This is all under some sort of construction - imagine there's unicorns and dragons or something...

Wednesday, 7 November 2012

Convention taime! - Animania

Ok so - I am so super duper sorry that I happen to be a lazy motha, I really am, its only going to get worse because Post-grad uni work starts NEXT WEEK, I'm going to die I'm going to be a little busy.

Are you sufficiently jealoussick satisfied with my revels in Filo-land? I'm not.

You
cannot Imagine the 'homesickness' I feel for the Philippines. There
have been genuine tears of nostalgia. And waking up wishing Little A
was sleeping next to me. And the puppy and the sunshine and the noise
and the pollution and the mayhem and the food and family.

Ugh.

Aaanyway. I went to a convention.

Behold!!!

After
getting back from Manila I went to into a flurry explosion of
craftingness and made decorative antlers and headbands to wear for my
new collection of products to sell at the T'EMPorium.

I
made a set a day and managed to make a relatively decent haul – at
least to cover costs and make a bit of profit, which, yay! I did.

Sold!

Sold!

I
was super duper happy to be seated next to Nekochii, The Geeky Bee and Curious Empire,
K, A, J and I split our time between chomping down on lots of
chocolate, watching J power through a level 80 sandwich and eventually
got bored and started scrapbooking by the last day. Also - Nekochii's J was also AMAZING and collabed with me by making adorable soft cuddly deer ears that accompanied my antler pieces!!!

slide on ears!

Also
– I had the flu. Fun times. I caught up with K on the set-up day
before the con and he got to behold me degenerate into this (again):

It was acceptable at the time...

Our
conversations revolved mostly around watching Rambo, zombies, Abraham
Lincoln (I guess cause of the vampire hunting movie? I don’t remember)
and my obsessive lust for frozen yoghurt, which he kindly took me to buy
after we finished setting up. When not chatting I was wobbly-ly
singing Maniac in order to not collapse in a fevered heap.

I
lost my voice! I had watery eyes! made worse by coloured contact
lenses. I swear that was an exercise in futility. The contact lenses
were 'Aqua', and they did not make even so much make a smidge of
difference on my eyes. HOW THE HELL?!?!?!? AQUA IS AN ENTIRELY WEIRD
COLOUR FOR SOMEONE WHO HAS BROWN-ISH EYES!!!!

Day
two got my Orchid Purple lenses which sort of scare me. They look like
circle lenses and you can still see the brown underneath.

Seriously, how do them gyarus and ganguros do it?

Aaanyhoo.
It was pretty fun playing dress up, and I got to really take good
advantage of my Illamasqua stash to make some interesting looks.
However, I will say this – False Lashes are the Enemy. I really wanted
to take a chance on them since they just look oh-so-pretty on other
people but damnit, they are stubborn little shitty thingimabobs and will
always, ALWAYS find a way to somehow curl in and poke me in the
eyeball. They ended up making a huge mess and I had to peel them off
before the day was done.

More
importantly, I managed to set up my table, the format was the same as
last year. I was sat next to my good old buddies but I must say, my
neighbours on the other side of me were a somewhat unfortunate (or not?
see further) choice.

Three tables
worth of Manga art books and Llama plushies are certainly harmless, and
the Llama plushies are a sure fire heart warmer for the likes of me,
but what really got me were the body size love pillow-cases hanging on
the walls of their booth, one was almost infringing onto my wall. All
naughty bits were covered by bright neon yellow post-it notes. You
know, for modesty.

oh the sexy (little girls)....

While I would
have laughed and made 4chan jokes in my earlier years, I barely batted
an eyelid (not just because it was glued open by lash-glue). I am no
stranger to giant, bouncy, bulbous, glowy…vegetables. I am also not
bothered by boobs. Love pillows are not that alien to me and hell, there
have been times when we (I do mean collectively, my friends and I) have
pitched in to buy a friend a pillow case in order to reinforce the joke
that the receiver is most likely some sort of sad-sack. I would give a
few more choice descriptions, but the internet fills that insult void
better than I do.

What did bother
me was the somewhat excessive amount of lolis prevalent in the designs.
I know hentai has focused a lot on the hyper sexualisation of females
who look underaged but this was getting damn uncomfortable. And while I
could talk about how buying a love-pillow with a seductive, innocent
looking loli on it is better than let's say, making a pass at some young
girl, the fact that this was even acceptable as being a product to be
sold at an event was just downright saying something. What that
something is, I haven't worked out yet.

Further,
while I didn't really see many of these pillows getting sold, (because
really, what self-conscious teenaged boy is going to go up there in
front of the eyes of so many onlookers and say, "uh, I'll take the one
with the pigtails please"?), I heard a ridiculous amount of immature
guffawing.

"Uhyuk, hawwww,
lookit that, nekkid gurls! haw haw!" And yes, this is an almost
true-to-life quote. I kid you not. It was like being in a corral of
donkeys. And it wasn't just the boys, it was EVERY ANIMU WEABOO FAN
THAT PASSED IT. Ok, I understand, young people, potential boobies,
titillation and all that. But really? But having that stall next to me
was just so weird. I'm not sure if it hurt sales, but it did hurt my
eardrums.

a bit too close... just a bit

It was great meeting up
with old friends though. Andrias from Poporetto and his sisters were
there and I managed to add an adorable miniature Captain Ameriwuff in a
bottle (along with a free badge!) to my collection. I now have a
veritable album of their work and they always get better! Also I have a
new cute beer bottle opener, SWEET!!!

Loot! (Triforce!!!)

Old
friends from Void also attended and I got my table cleaned out by a
very enthusiastic girl and her boyfriend (aka – human wallet). She
bought so much from me it was crazy! I gave her a free bracelet for her
enthusiasm.

people wanted the ponies more than the merch...

All in all, I sold
decently, at least on the first day. Sunday was atrocious. I started
to make beaded rings just to add new things to my table to sell. I was
bored and began to make scrapbooks and generally hallucinated after a
while because my voice was totally gone and my eyesight was doubled and
effed up three ways from Tuesday.

Singing 80s tunes helped, until I started dancing…

TELL ME THIS IS NOT MOTIVATING!!!

I
will take moment to give special acclaim to the vendor of ILikeShinies. She messaged me a few months ago saying that I had
inspired her to make her own little miniature cakes and sweeties
accessory shop. Frankly, while that was a really sweet and flattering
thing to tell me, I cannot for one second believe it because this girl
is AMAZING and I cannot possibly imagine how I could have inspired such
adorable and well made products when I used to have so much fucking
trouble making my own. Ugh, I bought a small bottle of young mandrake
root in a bottle and she gave me a Triforce pendant and a small bottle
of Felix Felicis. I gave her a customised sketchbook with all sorts of
deco-den stuff all over it. We hugged and squealed and I felt awesome
despite my flu.

I also got to
have a chat with Blue Fishies regarding the sales of indie art and
admired her epic draw skillz. Damnit photoshop – y u no do that for me?

Its
times like those when we share badges and talk to fellow vendors and
exchanging art that I feel completely and utterly satisfied about
attending things like this.

Sadly,
everything else was lacking. There were less cosplayers around and
from what I heard, the staff made it difficult for photographers to do
their shoots at the venue. The focal Japanese lifestyle booth was
horrible beyond belief. Normally there is a booth with a nice display
of some sort of Japanese cultural theme. Last year, it was a tea
ceremony display, the year before it was Lolita. This year it was this
horrifying wishing tree display with dirty cheap xmas trees and badly
tied paper wishes tied to the branches. And you had to pay to pick a
wish!!!!

Also – it looked like the Maid Café was a disappointment of epic proportions for all fans of things moe.

NoooooooOOOOOOOOOOOooooOOOOOOO!!!!!

The
skits were bland, boring and repetitive and THERE WAS TOO MUCH
GANGNAM!!! Even I got sick of Psy after one hour of constant repetition.

But hey, we did well and Nekochii and I celebrated with long awaited beer and Korean food.

Now,
I am going to work on new projects, and I have a nice photographing
session coming up to showcase my stuffs. I am so excited but am equally
nervous that every photo will have derp-face.

Also – I regretfully must mention that:

I got my postgrads! Yes, plural, certificate and diploma – YAY ME my studies was for naught, I now have pieces of paper.

paper paper paper

On the other hand, it also means – MORE STUDIES NOOOOOOOOOooooOOOooOO!!!!

I
have enrolled in my second-to-last class before I receive my masters
and damnit, I am so NOT looking forward to this. It’s a policing course
and I feel really out of my depth.

But as I say to that elusive masters qualification: CHALLENGE ACCEPTED. T_T…

Also – another niece/nephew is on the way!!! EEEEeeeeEEEEEEeeeeE!!!! clucky time!

Also
– new art projects, just because I am restarting my studies, I am not
going to give up on my work. So yes, full time job, part time studies,
all-time gaming and most-time crafting and arting.

CHALLENGE ACCEPTED AGAIN!

test project!

Also
– gaming, my computer is dying (sadface). Cant finish Borderlands, let
alone start B2 cause my computer keeps randomly shutting down!!! Its an
overheating issue I cannot fix myself so I need to save up a bit to get
it repaired. So no B2 or Dishonored for me – or XCOM (sob!!!!)

Also
– I still haven’t finished Dragon Age 2 – its so boring!!!! Why??? I
love killing things and running and armour and magic? I'll finish it
eventually, Borderlands is more fun at the moment and I am so incredibly
exited to play Dishonored.

Also
– I am actually still enjoying WoW. I love going from one place to
another. Buggered if I know what the quests are about? I never read the
descriptions. I just like the pretty landscapes.

So much true ;_;

So
– until next month, which hopefully has more pictures and better humor
and hopefully news that I have finished something, be it an academic
paper or a friggin video game.